As I was walking back from the U-store this morning, I thought to myself: “Man, I miss blogging!”. With the craziness of exams, being sick last week, and not to mention training, blogging has taken a bit of a backseat over the past couple of weeks. Fortunately, my exams are alllll over now, which means I can devote allll of my time to blogging! Ha, well not quite. I still have jobs to apply for, a senior thesis to write, and squash to train for, so I’m not exactly free as a bird, but I am feeling much more relaxed 🙂 .

Breakfast

Usually I am very picky about which kind of protein powder I mix with my Greek yogurt. In the past I’ve found that plant-based protein powders outweigh (or out-whey, get it?!) whey protein powders in the taste department when it comes to yogurt protein “pudding”.

However, I went out on a limb the other day to mix in some whey vanilla protein powder with my overnight oats, and was surprised how well the powder tasted when mixed with the yogurt, oats, fruit, and peanut butter. In fact, I’ve been loving my new combo so much, that I have been making it every morning for breakfast! Plus, you can’t beat it’s convenience!

Last night I combined the following ingredients in a tupperware dish to enjoy this morning:

1 cup 0% plain Fage Greek yogurt

a small handful of rolled oats

1 scoop vanilla protein powder

1 banana

4 frozen strawberries + a couple pieces of frozen mango

a little water to mix it all together

~2 Tbsp peanut butter

I had absolutely no trouble finishing this delicious breakfast off. It was a winnnna!

Workout

I had plans with our assistant coach to hit this morning, however due to some family issues, he had to cancel last minute. Since I was well fuelled and all ready in my workout clothes, I decided to head to the gym for a quick workout.

I followed up my 30 minute bike with a couple minutes of abs, and some light stretching. Usually I get bored pretty quickly when stretching by myself, and struggle to finish out a routine- especially when I get hungry! To combat the stretching-sorrows, I grabbed a Women’s Health magazine to keep myself entertained as I tried to stretch out my muscles.

It’s been ages since I’ve read a hard-copy magazine, and had completely forgotten how much fun it is! I usually check out articles online pretty frequently, but haven’t actually read a physical magazine in a long time. Maybe that’s some extra motivation to get back to the gym! 🙂

Post Workout

Now I’m re-fuelling with some coffee, water, blueberries, and a mango Chobani Greek yogurt. I forgot how hungry I get when I increase my training… I swear sometimes it’s endless!

Questions:

Do you read magazines at the gym during your workout or while you stretch?

This post is going to have to be on the shorter side because I have a 13 page paper to work on in French before I head off to practice! It’s not due until Tuesday, but I also have a problem set due later today (which is mostly done), and I don’t have any time to do work this weekend.

Why is that, you ask? Well, let’s get to Friday Favourites to find out! As always, thanks to Heather for hosting this link-up!

Friday Favourites

Matches vs Harvard and Dartmouth

We play Harvard and Dartmouth this weekend at home!!! Time to take down some Crimson and Big Green ;). (Side note: Why are their mascots just colours…?)

Anyway, that’s definitely #1 on my Friday Favourite’s this week, because our team has been training really hard, and is super excited to play our first match at home in 2015! I’ll be sure to recap on Monday after the matches have all finished :).

We also have our senior dinner this weekend, where all of the seniors’ parents come to watch, followed by a nice fancy dinner! It’s always a ton of fun, because the juniors write speeches about us 4th years, and they never fail to embarrass each and every player. I did my speech last year, and can honestly say it was both fun and emotional to get up there and speak about your teammate of 3 years. We’ve got some characters in the current senior class, so I’m nervous but also excited to see what the juniors come up with!

Hadley got me this scarf by Jocelyn as a belated birthday/Christmas present, and I am obsessed with it! It’s super cozy, and funnily enough, is a great studying accessory!

Although it’s small, this scarf has the comfort of your favourite blanket, so you don’t have to bring that excessively large item with you. Okay, to be honest I have never brought a blanket/sleeping bag or anything of the sort to to the library, but am now kind of contemplating the idea… Snuggie, anyone?!

Overnight oats comeback

It’s been too cold out, (and I’ve been too impatient), so I’ve been eating breakfast in my room lately instead of walking allll the way to a dining hall or Eating club. (Quick fact, yes we have these things at Princeton called “Eating club”, where some upperclassmen eat their meals).

Festive interior light decor

At the end of last year, my friend Johanna (the one who gave me the S’well water bottle for my birthday!), was passing on a bunch of her things to others, much of which was barely used IKEA stuff. Sadly I missed the boat for the IKEA furniture, but I was able to score a few other things, including these small LED bulb lights!

I love how lights add a bit of pizazz (<– second time in my life I think I’ve ever said that word) to a room- especially a dorm room! Thanks again, Johanna!

Since my headphones were still under their year warranty, I sent them back a couple of months ago, requesting a new pair. Don’t you just lovveeee how slow the mail process can be sometimes? Well, when I returned to school this January, my headphones had finally arrived for me in the mail!

They really do have great sound quality, but I am hoping that these ones last! And if they don’t, well then I’m hoping I can redeem yet another warranty :).

Okay, time for me to head off! Not only do I have work to do, but there’s also this annoying bird outside my window whose “call” sounds much like a human hiccup. Gah, birds!

It is Wednesday, so I’m going to link up with Jenn for What I Ate Wednesday (WIAW), and share some of my latest meals ‘n’ things. Word has it you guys like seeing pictures of food, so let’s get to it!

This week’s edition ofWIAW is Back to School themed, since today is my last first day of classes! (Whaaaaaat!)

On Monday night I went to a spin class with Hadley, and afterwards grabbed dinner from Olives. I ordered a Thai kale chicken salad with soy vinaigrette. There were tons of toppings, including water chestnuts, edamame, and cashews. Gotta love flavourful plentiful salads!

Olives is a huge student favourite at Princeton, mostly because it offers sandwiches, salads, and hot entrees that can be customized and adapted however you want. Plus, the staff is super friendly, and will remember you, so it really feels like a family environment.

And now I’m currently sipping an iced Americano while blogging from Small World, a local coffee shop just off campus.

Ice ice baby

Yumz yumz yumz.

Workout

It’s been forever since I’ve been to yoga, so today at noon I’m going to go to a vinyasa yoga class! I’m stoked to see if my new pushup ability will translate to a better chaturanga. Here’s hoping!

I’m also teaching two 30 minute spin classes tonight, which I’m pretty excited about. I haven’t taught all summer, which was a nice break, but I’m ready to put some of the tips I picked up from other instructors into my own routine!

Questions:

Have you ever tried Paleokrunch granola?

What’s new for you this September? Starting classes, a new job, or anything?

I tend to go through breakfast phases where I’ll consistently eat one thing until all of a sudden I change it up, and that previous item doesn’t make it back into the rotation for a loonnnnng while. It’s not that I get sick of that breakfast item, I just become infatuated with one of the many other options there are to try! Gotta love breakfast food 🙂

Right, so overnight oats. Honestly, I don’t even measure out the ingredients anymore. I scoop a bunch of yogurt into a plastic container, grab a handful of outs right out of the bag or jar, sprinkle dump in some chia seeds, and finally pour in a generous amount of milk before stirring all of the ingredients together.

It’s not rocket science 😀

However, if it’s your first time making overnight oats, you might want a few numbers and measurements in there to make put your mind at ease. (Because it’s just so stressful making breakfast…).

After posting last night about getting enough sleep, I proceeded to stay up until 1:30 am working on a project :(. Definitely not ideal, but hey, sometimes life gets in the way, right?

Anyway, here are some (mostly) pretty food pics of my meals lately. They’re unintentionally mostly vegetarian, mainly because I haven’t been inspired to cook meat when it’s so hot out. Fortunately I’ve been able to integrate protein into my diet in a variety of ways, and I haven’t missed meat one bit!

Overnight Oats

Ever since my Chobani Experimentation on Monday, I’ve been addicted to the Greek yogurt and oats combo. There’s so many different ways to make it interesting and different, and lately Ive been loving the addition of frozen fruit to change up the flavours.

Until I ran out of frozen mango (which I go through in about a day), Mango overnight oats made a couple appearances for my morning meal.

Inspired by Apple Cinnamon Chobani Oats, I made myself Apple Cinnamon Overnight Oats, and they were deeeelicious.

The past few mornings I’ve been enjoying Peach Overnight Oats.

As I prepped my breakfast for tomorrow morning, I snapped some pictures of the 2-minute assembling process so that I could post a recipe soon. Overnight Oats for everyone! 😀

Salads

It’s been so warm out (and I’m not complaining), that I haven’t felt like heating up the apartment even more by cooking hot meals. I’ve also been trying to focus on eating more vegetables, and I find that salads are a great way for me to throw a bunch of veggies in a bowl and get a few servings in at once.

A kale, sweet potato, feta, and cranberry salad from Fuel did the trick for lunch earlier this week!

More tortilla chips! This salad is awfully similar to the one pictured above, but without turkey, carrots or sriracha sauce.Green salad with tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots, and a whole wack of feta cheese. They piled it on high!

You tired of my similar salads yet? This one has a base of spinach, topped with cottage cheese, garlic hummus, carrots, black beans, pistachios, and deli turkey.

I ate this fresh salad outside on the porch while reading and relaxing in the sun.

Okay well minus several spoonfuls of cashew butter, a couple bananas, and some Goldfish crackers, that’s a fairly good recap of my latest eats. The following week should have some fairly vibrant, fresh, and (hopefully) delicious dishes, because I went grocery shopping today and bought vegetables! And I plan on getting a little more creative than the basic salad.